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Smart News / Smart News Science

The two divers spent an hour or so swimming alongside the giant barrel jellyfish.

Divers Encounter a Human-Size Jellyfish Off the Coast of England

Barrel jellyfish typically grow to a length of up to 3 feet, but this one measured closer to 5 feet long

Researchers previously believed that traces of animal fat left in pottery stemmed from feasts held by Stonehenge's builders.

Did Stonehenge’s Builders Use Lard to Move Its Boulders Into Place?

Animal fat residue found on ceramic vessels suggests the ancient Britons who built the monument greased their wooden sledges with lard

New Research

Study Finds Insects Can Experience Chronic Pain

Injured fruit flies still experience nerve pain after healing, a finding that could lead the way to more non-opioid pain medications

Alan Turing Will Be the New Face of Britain’s £50 Note

Persecuted at the end of his life, the British mathematician and code-breaker is now widely admired as a father of computer science

In 2019, 50 years after the Apollo 11 moon landing, Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit stands as one of the most significant artifacts in the world.

Apollo at 50: We Choose to Go to the Moon

Neil Armstrong’s Restored Spacesuit Put Back on Display at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum

The spacesuit, which Armstrong wore when he walked on the moon during Apollo 11, is available for public viewing and as a 3-D model online

Great Blue Heron

Audubon Photography Award Winners Show the Breathtaking Beauty of Wild Birds

The 10th installment of the competition featured two new categories

Future of Space Exploration

First Moon-Forming Disk Detected Swirling Around an Exoplanet

Telescope observations suggest that a cloud of gas and dust around a planet 370 light-years away may be coalescing into planet-sized moons

Trending Today

One of the Largest Subspecies of Giraffes Is Declared Endangered

Once the largest of nine subspecies, Masai giraffe numbers have dropped by an estimated 50 percent in the last 30 years

Poker poses a challenge to A.I. because it involves multiple players and a plethora of hidden information.

This Poker-Playing A.I. Knows When to Hold ‘Em and When to Fold ‘Em

Pluribus won an average of around $5 per hand, or $1,000 per hour, when playing against five human opponents

New Research

140 Million Years Ago, a Bird-Like Dinosaur Swallowed a Lizard Whole. Here’s Why Its Final Meal Is Exciting Researchers

The lizard is a piece of a complex ancient food web being pieced together in northeast China

A reconstruction of Elektorornis chenguangi, showing the possible probing function of the elongated toe.

This Prehistoric Bird Had Weirdly Long Toes

Researchers think the newly described ‘Elektorornis chenguangi’ used its special digits to scoop insects out of trees

New Research

Mussels’ Sticky Threads Could Inspire Ways to Clean Up Oil Spills, Purify Water and More

A new review shows the sticky threads the bivalves used to cling to rocks could have lot of potential engineering applications

An olive python swallows an Australian freshwater crocodile whole

See a Python Swallow a Crocodile Whole

A kayaker captured the gruesome photographs while exploring a swamp in Queensland, Australia

Apidima 1 and reconstruction.

This 210,000-Year-Old Skull May Be the Oldest Human Fossil Found in Europe

A new study could shake up the accepted timeline of Homo Sapiens’ arrival on the continent—though not all experts are on board

New Research

Little, Transparent Fish Show Sleep Is at Least 450 Million Years Old

Imaging of sleeping zebrafish reveal their pattern of Zzz’s is similar to that of mammals and other animals, meaning snoozing has been around a long time

Lead author Emily Fobert says, “The presence of light is clearly interfering with an environmental cue that initiates hatching in clownfish"

Cool Finds

Thanks to Light Pollution, We’re Losing Nemo

In trials, light-exposed eggs hatched normally as soon as scientists removed an overhead LED designed to simulate artificial light conditions

New Research

California’s Drought Killed Almost 150 Million Trees

The forests were too dense and temperatures were much higher than in previous droughts, exhausting water supplies and leading to mass die-offs

Olafur Eliasson, "The Cubic Structural Evolution Project," 2004

Art Meets Science

Consider the Nature of Perception at Olafur Eliasson’s New Show

Tate Modern retrospective features some 40 works pulled from the artist’s decades-long career

You've goat a friend in me.

Goats May Be Able to Tell When Their Buddies Are Feeling Good or Baaad

A new study has found that the animals can distinguish between positive and negative vocalizations

Let me see you shake your tail feathers.

New Research

What This Head-Banging, Body-Rolling Cockatoo Teaches Us About the Evolution of Dance

Researchers found internet-famous Snowball has 14 unique moves and five neural traits that lead him to the dancefloor

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